Good evening. Let's open tonight's service
with hymn number 40 from the hardback hymnal, number 40. Great
is thy faithfulness. Let's all stand together, number
40. Great is Thy faithfulness, O
God my Father! There is no shadow of turning
with Thee. Thou changest not, thy compassions,
they fail not. As thou hast been, thou forever
wilt be. Great is thy faithfulness, great
is thy faithfulness. Morning by morning, new mercies All I have needed thy hand hath
provided. Great is thy faithfulness, Lord,
unto me. Summer and winter and springtime
and harvest, sun, moon, and stars in their courses above. ? Join with all nature in manifold
witness ? ? To thy great faithfulness, mercy and love ? ? Great is thy
faithfulness, great is thy faithfulness ? ? Morning by morning new mercy
I see all I have needed thy hand hath provided great is thy faithfulness
Lord unto me. Pardon for sin and a peace that
endureth Thine own dear presence to cheer and to guide. Strength for today and bright
hope for tomorrow. Blessings all mine with 10,000
beside. Great is thy faithfulness, great
is thy faithfulness. Morning by morning new mercies
I see. All I have needed thy hand hath
provided. Great is thy faithfulness, Lord,
unto me. Please be seated. Somebody texted me today and
said that they were thankful for the Lord's mercy and for
His grace and I said, Confessing that from the heart is the greatest
evidence of being thankful. His faithfulness is, well, he's
always faithful, always faithful. Open your Bibles with me please
to Romans chapter eight. We'll read a few verses in here
for our call to worship. Romans chapter eight, I hope
these verses will will help us in our understanding of Psalm
102. For I reckon, and that word reckon
means I am sure, that the sufferings of this present time are not
worthy to be compared with the glory which shall be revealed
in us. For the earnest expectation of
the creature waiteth for the manifestation of the sons of
God. For the creature was made subject to vanity, not willingly,
but by reason of him who has subjected the same in hope. In
other words, when Adam sinned, all of creation was cast down
and brought into confusion. Because the creature itself,
shall be delivered from the bondage of corruption into the glorious
liberty of the children of God. For we know that the whole creation
groaneth and travaileth in pain together until now. And not only
they, but ourselves also, which have the first fruits of the
spirit, even we ourselves groan within ourselves, waiting for
the adoption to wit the redemption of our bodies. So we're waiting
for it. the redemption of our bodies,
our souls have been redeemed, our sins been put away, our bodies
are still corrupt, and our old man is still there in our old
nature. For we are saved by hope, but
hope that is seen is not hoped. For what a man seeth, why did
he yet hope for? For if we hope for that which
we see not, then do we with patience wait for it. It's called faith. The substance of things hoped
for, the evidence of things not seen. Likewise, the spirit also,
and here's the verse I wanted you to see these next couple
of verses. The spirit also helpeth our infirmities for we know not
what we should pray for as we ought. but the spirit itself
maketh intercession for us with groanings which cannot be uttered.
And he that searcheth the hearts knoweth what is the mind of the
spirit because he maketh intercession for the saints according to the
will of God. So we pray, we don't know how
to pray. We don't know what we ought to
pray for. But we pour out our hearts to God, trusting that
the spirit of God knows the will of God perfectly. And he makes
our, he makes our prayers perfect before God. And we know, we know
that all things, however, the Lord, please, please to show
forth his faithfulness, whether it be through life or through
death, however, he shows forth his faithfulness. We know. that
all things work together for good for them that love God and
those that are the called according to his purpose. We know that,
don't we, brother? What a confidence, what a hope,
what a savior. Jennifer's having her surgery
tomorrow around noon at Mayo up in Jacksonville. wants to
pray for her and the doctors that will be administered to
her. And, um, I understand that, um, Don has not heard back from
his doctors yet as far as when his surgery will be. Um, they're
very reluctant to do the surgery, not sure if he can survive it.
So, um, pray for Don and Shelby and church in Danville. Let's
pray together. Our faithful. Loving. Compassionate. All powerful Heavenly Father. We come before thy throne of
grace. Thanking you that. Your Holy Spirit. Offers up prayers
through our groanings. According to the will of God.
And Lord, you've told us that if we pray anything according
to your will, we shall have it. Lord, we don't know what your
will is in terms of temporal things, but we know that whatever
it is is right. Whatever it is, it's good. Whatever
it is, it will be for your glory And it'll be for the salvation
of your people. Lord, we ask for mercy. We, we
pray that, that your, your providence would be, um, Lord, we pray that it'd be easy
on us. Pray for your hand of strength and healing. We play
for your. For the spirit of your grace to be upon all those that
are in need and pray especially for Jennifer and John and ask
Lord that you would draw them near to yourself and comfort
their hearts and give them the assurance of your presence and
of your peace. Pray for the doctors that minister
to Jennifer tomorrow and ask Lord that you would direct their
hands and make them skillful and pray that you would be pleased
to. To bring healing and strength
to Jennifer's body. We pray for Don and for Shelby
and for the church in Danville and. Lord, we ask for an abundance
of your mercy and your grace there to provide for them and
their every need and give the doctors. Good judgment in making their
decisions and in. In performing their duties, we
ask it in Christ name. Amen. We're gonna sing the hymn that's,
hopefully it's glued to the back page of your gospel hymn spiral
hymn book. This is the same, it is well
with my soul that's in the hardback, but it's got the extra verses
added back in. So, should be in the back flap
of the gospel hymns. Let's all stand together. When peace like a river attendeth
my way, When sorrows like sea billows roll, Whatever my lot,
Thou hast taught me to say, It is well, it is well with my soul. It is well with my soul. It is well, it is well with my
soul. Though Satan should buffet, though
trials should come, let this blessed assurance control. That Christ hath regarded my
helpless estate, And hath shed his own blood for my soul. It is well, it is well with my
soul, with my soul. It is well, it is well with my
soul. My sin, O the bliss of this glorious
thought, My sin not in part, but the whole, Is nailed to the
cross, and I bear it no more, Praise the Lord, praise the Lord,
O my soul. It is well with my soul. It is well, it is well with my
soul. For me, be it Christ, be it Christ
to live. If Jordan above me shall roll,
no pang shall be mine. For in death, as in life, thou
wilt whisper thy peace to my soul. It is well, it is well with my soul. It is well, it
is well with my soul. But Lord, tis for Thee, for Thy
coming we wait. The sky, not the grave, is our
goal. O trump of the angel, O voice
of the Lord, blessed hope, blessed rest for my soul. It is well with my soul. It is well, it is well with my
soul. O Lord, haste the day when the
faith shall be sight, the clouds be rolled back as a scroll, the
trump shall resound, and the Lord shall descend, Even so,
it is well with my soul. It is well. It is well. With my soul. With my soul. It is well. It is well with my
soul. Please be seated. Will you open your Bibles with
me to Psalm 102? Psalm 102. Thank you Tom for
that. That him that was a great encouragement
and I think will go well with. This passage of Scripture tonight.
Notice in the introduction of Psalm 102. A prayer. Of the afflicted. When he is overwhelmed. and pour
it out his complaint before the Lord. This is a prayer of those that are that
are confused, those that are overwhelmed with circumstances
and with sin. What a glorious prayer the Lord's
given us to offer up to him these words of complaint, these words
for mercy. Lord, I need your help. I need
it speedily. I need it now. I need you to
come. I need you to minister grace to my heart and help me
in the circumstances that you've ordained for me. And we have the promise of God's
word that he hears our prayers and he answers them. But the reason why the Lord hears
our prayers and answers them is not because of the depth of
our commitment or the strength of our faith. It is because the
Lord Jesus Christ prayed this prayer first and foremost. and God heard him and answered
his prayer. I, you know, we're pleading with
the city right now for them to reduce our impact fees. And our engineer is very religious. And he's been telling me that he's
praying that, you know, that the Lord's going to give us this
money back. And, uh, and I've told him many,
many times, I've said, well, you know, the heart of the King's
in the hand of the Lord and he directs it with us wherever he
wills. And I hope he will too, but if he doesn't, that'll be
his will. And that'll be his, that'll be his purpose too. Oh
no, no, you can't think like that. And I thought, oh no, Lord. You're going to take this money
just to show him that his prayers in all of his faith and all of
his commitment is not going to be the thing that you're going
to listen to. And then I thought, no, if he's not one of the Lords,
maybe the Lord will answer his prayer to put him deeper into
his, you know, into, into his deceit. And so, yeah, I don't
know what the Lord is going to do. But I know this, I know that
he doesn't respond to our prayers because of the commitment of
our faith. He responds to our prayers because
the Lord Jesus Christ has prayed for us. And he's the one that
was afflicted. We don't know affliction like
he knew affliction. And he's the one that poured
out his soul in complaint to his father. When he cried, my God, my God,
why hast thou forsaken me? His whole life was a life of
affliction. Turn with me before we begin
this Psalm in verse 17. Look at, yeah, before we begin
in verse one, look at verse 17. He will regard the prayer of
the destitute and not despise their prayer. That's how we come, don't we?
Lord, I'm destitute. That's why we conclude all of
our prayers with, Lord, be thy will. We pray according to the
name and the will of the Lord Jesus Christ, and Lord, whatever
you're pleased to do. Whatever you're pleased to do.
In our afflictions, we're hoping for some relief. We would like
that. We would like your providence
to be easy. But sometimes it's not. But his
purpose and his will is always good and it's always right. And the hope that we have that
he hears us. Is that he heard his son? He
heard the prayer of his son. When the Lord Jesus Christ was
suffering under the affliction of the hand of his father, he
pours out his soul. To God. And he says, hear my
prayer, oh Lord, and let my cry come unto thee. You know, God's people are sensible
of their need and their weakness. This is always, this ought to
always be our prayer. Look at verse two, hide not thy
face from me in the day when I am in trouble. Lord, I'm always
in trouble. Now, we're not talking about
a cringing fear of not measuring up to the law. Perfect love casts
about that fear. But when we look at how fragile
we are and You know, I feel like Job most of the time. Job said,
I am delivered by the skin of my teeth. You know, I feel like
my faith is more like hide and seek. You know, the Lord hides
his face in order to make us seek him and we're always seeking
him and as soon as we catch a little glimpse, a little glimpse, it's
like There it is, gone, gone. Peter put it like this in 1 Peter
chapter 4 verse 18, he said, if the righteous, if the righteous
scarcely be saved, where shall the ungodly and the sinner appear?
Now he's not talking about the scarcity of the atonement, that
was pure and perfect and complete. We're not scarcely saved in terms
of what Christ did to save us. But we're scarcely saved in our
experience, aren't we? How many times have you felt
like you hear the parable of the four soils, and how many
times have you been blessed by something that God spoke to your
heart about in the service while the message was being preached
and couldn't remember when you got to the door? I've had some of you say to me,
you know, that, well, there's something in that message that
really spoke to me and now I can't remember what it was. You just
got to, and you feel like, Lord, am I wayside here? Has the devil
plucked away the seed that quickly? Lord, has the seed of the gospel
fell on rocky soil? Does it have no depth of root
to it? Is it being choked out by the
things of this world? Lord, is it I? You see, in that
regard, we're always in trouble, aren't we? We're always in trouble. Job said, I have escaped by the
skin of my teeth. You ever feel like that? It's called walking by faith. And God hides his face in order to cause us to seek
him. The walk of faith is a relationship of hide and seek with God. Isaiah chapter 45 verse 15 says,
Verily thou art a God that hideth himself. He hideth himself. Why does he hide himself? To
cause us to seek him. Where does he hide himself? He hides himself in his word.
That's where he hides himself, in his word. You know, I've had
so many people say to me, well, you know, I know that God's working
in my life because this happened or that happened, and they're
looking to circumstances and feelings and situations that
are all subjective and becoming convinced that God's at work.
You know, maybe God is doing some of that. Well, truth is,
he's doing all of it. You know, when you think about
the will of God, There are two ways in which the will of God
can be understood. It's the will of God's decrees. That's his purpose. And everything
according to that will is accomplished perfectly. So everything that's
happening is happening according to the will of God. We are smack
dab in the middle of God's will when it comes to the will of
God's decrees. And then there's the will of
God's commandment. And that has never been fulfilled except once. No words, everything according
to God's decrees is being fulfilled in everything that's happening
and never has the will of God. You would talk about people say,
well, I want to do God's will. You've never done it. Never done
God's will. Never kept God's law. We have
one that has, you see the will of God's commandments only been
kept once, hadn't it? And this, and, and, and this
trouble that we're in, you know, it's because the Lord keeps hiding
his face from us. And people, people look to their,
you know, feelings come and feelings go. Feelings are deceiving. My
only warrant is the word of God. None else is worth believing.
Isn't that what the hymn writer said? That's so true. He hides
himself in his word. You know, I was thinking, Tricia
and I were talking about this yesterday. How many churches, how many Bible
schools, how many seminaries, how many people are diligently studying this
book? And how many believe it? There must be hundreds of thousands
of people in this world that are studying the Bible for every
person who believes the Bible. Because they had no love for
the truth therefore God sent them a strong delusion that they
might believe the lie. What is the means by which God
sends men a delusion? Right here. Right here. God's written his
word in such a way to give men enough rope to hang themselves
and men rest the scriptures and twist the scriptures. And they
come to conclusions. What the Lord said to the Pharisees,
you search the scriptures. You're very diligent about your
Bible study. Because you think in them you have eternal life.
You think that if you can just learn the doctrine and learn
the theology and memorize the scripture and get it all down,
you know, get all your ducks in a row, that that'll earn you
favor with God. And this is where the Lord's
hid. He's hidden it in the volume
of the book it is written to me, but these are they which
testify of me. You've missed Christ. I was talking
to somebody yesterday. I said, you know, they're searching
after wisdom. I said, Christ is our wisdom.
God has made him to be our wisdom, our righteousness, our sanctification,
and our redemption. Wisdom is personified. Yes, we're
to seek after wisdom, but not the wisdom of man. God makes
foolish 1 Corinthians 1, the wisdom of man. Man, when man
by wisdom knew not God. Man by all of his wisdom could
not figure out God. Turn with me to that passage,
1 Corinthians chapter 1. Verse 20, where is the wise?
Where is the scribe? Where is the disputer of this
world? Hath not God made foolish the wisdom of this world? For
after that in the wisdom of God, the world by wisdom knew not
God, it pleased God by the foolishness of preaching to save them that
believe. For the Jews require sign, the
Greeks seek after wisdom, but we preach Christ crucified. Unto the Jews a stumbling block
and unto the Greeks foolishness, but to them which are called,
both Jews and Greeks, Christ is the power of God and he is
the wisdom of God. So this, the Lord has hid himself
in his word. And men study the scriptures
because they're looking for wisdom outside of Christ. They're looking
for some knowledge and some understanding and some truth and some experience
or some rule or regulation to follow after. Lord, I'm in trouble. Go back
with me to our text, hide not thy face from me in the day when
I am in trouble. Why does the, the Lord hides
himself in his word? Why does he do it? Well, because
the natural man cannot receive the things of the spirit, they're
spiritually discerned because spirit of God has to, has to,
has to enlighten the eyes of our understanding. He's the one
that has to reveal Christ to us. Lord, why do you speak to
them in parables? Because it's not for them to
know the mystery of the kingdom of God. It's for you. It's not for them. So the child
of God says, Lord, I'm in trouble. Lord, if you don't reveal Christ
to me, if you don't open the mystery of the gospel in your
word to my heart, open that which no man can shut, open my heart,
open the windows of heaven. If you don't come down and speak
to me, Lord, there's no way I can, I won't be saved. I won't be
saved. I'm just on the cusp all the
time. As soon as I think I've got some
truth, it's like it tries to vanish away. What are you doing,
Lord? I'm hiding myself from you. But why, Lord? To make you
search me out. Verily, thou art a God that hideth
thyself. Father, I thank thee that thou
hast hid these things from the wise and the prudent and revealed
them unto babes. Even so, Father, seem good in
thy sight. Oh Lord, make me, make me a baby. What can babies do? What can
they do? Two things. They can cry and
they mess themselves up and that's about all we're good at, isn't
it? Lord, and that's what, that's what, hear my prayer, oh Lord,
and let my cry come unto thee. Hide not thy face from me, Lord,
I know what it's like for you to hide yourself from me. And every time you seem, it seems
like I can't see you and you word, it's like my prayers are
hitting brass and I, and it's, it's, Lord, I'm in trouble. My trouble
is me. My trouble is my sin. My trouble
is my unbelief. That's my trouble. Here's the good news. Brethren,
everyone that is of the truth here is my voice. They hear me. I give them ears to hear, the
hearing ear and the seeing eye there for the Lord. Turn to me
that passage in Isaiah chapter 45, Isaiah 45. Verse 7, I form the light, I
create darkness, I make peace, and create evil. I, the Lord,
do all these things. He's sovereign over everything. Whatever light we have, he's
given it to us. When he turns the lights down,
He's, that's his, that's his hiding his face. That's his making
us to seek after him. Look at, look at verse 15. Verily, truly thou art a God
that hideth thyself, O God of Israel, the Savior. They shall
be ashamed and also confounded, all of them. They shall go to
confusion to gather that are makers of idols, but Israel shall
be saved. in the Lord with an everlasting
salvation he shall not be ashamed nor confounded world without
end with an everlasting salvation there's my hope that the Lord's
chosen a people and and redeemed a people in the lamb slain before
the foundation of the world in the covenant of grace for thus
saith the Lord that created the heavens God himself that formed
the earth and made it He hath established it, He created it,
not in vain. He formed it to be inhabited.
I am the Lord and there is none else. I have not spoken in secret
in a dark place of the earth. I said not unto the seed of Jacob,
seek ye me in vain. I didn't say seek me in vain,
seek me and see if you can find me. No, you seek me and you will
find me. That's what the Lord said, seek
me and you'll find me. But I'm going to hide my face
from you and cause you to see your trouble. Your trouble is
your sin. It's our sin that separates us
from God. But the Lord says, seek me and you will find me. Knock, the door will be opened
unto you. Ask, it shall be given unto you. How many of you, if you have
a child and your child asks for a loaf of bread, would give him
a stone? Or if they asked for a fish would give him a serpent. You wouldn't do that to your
own children. Why? Because you love them. And if
you being evil know how to give good gifts unto your children,
how much more will your heavenly father give the Holy Spirit to
them that ask him. That is something we know that
God's will is. Lord, I need your spirit. If
I'm going to see you, your spirit is the one that's going to have
to enable me to do that. The spirit of God is the one
that points us to Christ. That's what the Lord said. When
the comforter comes, he will lead you into all truth and he'll
point you to me. Look, look, look at, uh, verse 19 or verse,
um, Yes, verse 19, I've not spoken
in secret in a dark place of the earth. I said not to the
seat of Jacob, seek ye me in vain. I, the Lord, speak righteousness. I declare things that are right. Assemble yourselves together.
Come, draw near together. You that are escaped of the nations. That's what Job said. He said,
I've escaped by the skin of my teeth. Feel like that's how you've
escaped sometime, doesn't it? Lord, I'm just escaping by the
skin of my teeth. Lord, help me. I'm in trouble. What's the Lord say? Gather yourself
together. Seek me. I'm going to. I'm going to reveal myself in
my word to my people. Now. This prayer. is a great encouragement and
comfort to the child of God. Because we have all these glorious
promises that the Lord will answer those who come to him in the
name of his dear son. But the greatest encouragement
is that the Lord Jesus Christ prayed this prayer. Hear me,
look at the prayer. Hear my prayer, O Lord, and let
not my cry come unto thee. Let my cry come unto thee. Oh,
no one cried like the Lord Jesus Christ cried. No one ever felt
the burden of sin like the Lord Jesus Christ felt the burden
of sin. He bore our iniquities. He was afflicted with our sin.
God made him sin who knew no sin that we might be made the
righteousness of God in him. All the shame and all, you know,
we get, we get all, we get in trouble when we fall under the
conviction of one sin that we've committed. And the Lord was He was burdened with, he was
convicted by every sin that every child of God ever committed. How could that be? Only an infinite
God could do that. And he bore our sins before the
Father. And it pleased God to bruise him. And here he's crying
out from the cross, Lord, hear my prayer. And the Father heard
his prayer. And that's the encouragement
that we have, that when we're in trouble, our God hears our
prayers. Hide not thy face from me in
the day when I am in trouble. From 12 o'clock until 3 o'clock
in the afternoon, the sky was black. I mean, it was pitch black. darkness over the earth. And
it was that, what did that centurion say? Truly that was the son of
God. The earth shook, the sky was blackened, the Lord Jesus
Christ cried out, my God, my God, why hast thou forsaken me?
God had hidden his face from him. His eyes, the eyes of God
were too pure to look upon sin. And he saw the sin and the iniquity
of God's people and had to forsake his son. We don't know what that means.
We're so we can go three hours without fellowship with God and
not feel a bit of pain about it. Can't we, we can go three hours
without thinking about God for one, for one little bit and doesn't
bother us a bit. Incline thine ear unto me in
the day when I call. Answer me speedily. Oh, and the father did answer
him. And when the Lord hides his face from us. And the Lord. Allows us to see the frailty
of our flesh. And the and the weakness of our
faith. and our dependence upon the faithfulness
of the Lord Jesus Christ to be our intercessor, to be the one
who prays for us. What made the difference between
Peter and Judas? Peter, before the cock crows,
you're gonna deny me three times, but be of good cheer, for I have
prayed for you. And pray for Judas, he's gone,
he's on a perdition. But I prayed for you, Peter.
And when you've been converted, teach the brethren. In all of
Peter's ministry, in all of his life, he remembered that, encouraging
the church because of his own failures. Father, I pray not
for the world. I pray for them which thou hast
given me out of the world. Thine they were. Thou hast given
them unto me. Lord, I've given them your word.
I've sanctified them by your word. And that's how the Lord
continues to sanctify us by his word. He, he reveals himself
in his word. Let the unbeliever twist the
scriptures all they want. Let them, let them accuse the gospel preachers. of telling lies. They're accusing us of the very
thing that they're guilty of. For my days are consumed like
smoke. Oh, we don't know how smoke.
There it is. There's a fire, smoke, watch
it, and it's gone. It's gone. Lord, teach me the
number of my days that I may know how frail I am. The Lord
Jesus Christ, his life was cut short. 33 years. Very brief life for the days
for my days are consumed like smoke and my bones are burned
as a hearth. My heart is smitten. Withered
like grass so that I forget to eat my bread. What'd the Lord
say to those disciples when they went down into Sychar to get
some food? They came back and the Lord said, I've got meat
to eat that you know not of. I'm not dependent on that physical
bread. My meat is to do the will of him that sent me. And here
he's saying that I forget to eat my bread. So consumed with my troubles
and with the burden of the sin that I'm bearing, I'm consumed
with the call that the father has given me to be faithful and
obedient to. I forget to eat. By reason of the voice of my
groaning, my bones cleave to my skin. I am like a pelican of the wilderness. I am like an owl of the desert. And what is a pelican and an
owl? They're unclean animals. They're
unclean animals. What's the Lord saying? I'm in
the wilderness. I'm in the desert. This is a
dry and thirsty. I've come, I'm suffering the
contradiction of sinners. I've come into this world. I
came into my own, my own received me not. Everything in this world
was contrary to Christ and still is, still is. You preach the gospel to unbelievers,
you talk to your unbelieving friends about the gospel, you'll
find out. You know that's true, don't you? They hate Christ.
They hate him. And he says, I'm like a, I'm
like a pelican. I'm like an owl, like an unclean
bird. And he's speaking of burying
our sins in his body upon that tree. He carried our griefs.
He bore our sorrows. The chastisement of our peace
was upon him. And by his stripes, we are healed. Here he is. He's saying, I'm
like an unclean bird in a dry land. But then next, look at
the next verse. Look at the next verse. I watch
and am as a sparrow. Now what's a sparrow? A sparrow
is a clean bird. It's a clean bird. Remember the Lord said, two sparrows
are sold for a farthing and are you not worth much more to the
heavenly father than a bird, a sparrow? The Lord's, why do
we have such value to God? Because of Christ. Because of
our union with Christ is why we have value to him. Not because
of anything in ourselves. And you remember Leviticus and
the cleansing of the leper and you know, leprosy is a picture
of our sin condition. And in Leviticus chapter 14,
the Lord told Moses, you tell Aaron to take two birds and kill
one of them and take the blood of that dead bird and put it
in a basin and put in there cedar wood and scarlet and hyssop. There's a picture of the cross. and the flogging of Christ and
the blood of Christ. And you take the clean bird and
dip him in that blood while you're running water over him. What's
that a picture of? The living water. The running
water. It's called running water in
Leviticus 14. And that's the Spirit of God. And the Lord Jesus
Christ, when he bore our sins on Calvary's cross, the God-man. Did God die? No, but the God-man
died. The one bird died. The other
bird, after it was dipped in the blood under the running water,
was let go. Was let go. And we have the dual
nature of Christ. As a man, bearing our sins before
God, he died as a sinless man, a perfect man. And under the running of the
spirit of God, the deity of Christ, he couldn't
stay in the grave, could he? He conquered the grave, he conquered
death, he conquered hell. And now he says, I'm like a sparrow,
I'm like a little bird, like that bird, a clean bird. And I thought about, you know,
yeah, you know, clean animals were that which you could eat
and unclean animals were animals you couldn't eat. Oh, who would
ever eat a sparrow? I mean, there wouldn't be enough
meat on it to do much. You wouldn't give much attention to a sparrow
unless you were starving. If you were starving, you'd eat
a sparrow. And that's the only people that eat sparrows. The
only people that feed on Christ are people that are starving. In one sense, I'm like a pelican.
I'm like an owl in the wilderness and in the desert. And in another
sense, I'm like a sparrow alone upon the housetop. Now, what's the house of God?
The church. Here we got the sparrow sitting
on top of the house all by himself, looking out, watching over his
house. A little sparrow, an insignificant
bird that nobody pays any attention to. And if that sparrow fall to the
ground, Your heavenly father knows. And
when the Lord Jesus Christ was going to Calvary's cross, the
scripture says he fell to the ground. That's when I had to help him
with the cross, remember that? He fell to the ground. Your heavenly
father knows. And your worth, when you fall
to the ground, and when you're in trouble, and when you're afflicted,
is because he bore your sorrows and your grief. And he satisfied
the fulfillment of God's law. And he put away all of your sin. And for that reason, for that
reason, you can have confidence that you pour out your soul before
God in your time of need. He's going to hear you. He's
going to hear you. Verse eight, mine enemies reproach
me all the day, and they that are mad against me are sworn
against me. And I've had several occasions. I don't say this. Please don't
misunderstand. I don't feel like a martyr in
any way. I'm an unprofitable servant.
That's all I am, is an unprofitable servant. But it's clear to me
when people when people object to the truth of the gospel, and
they make accusations against me, that they're under the influence
of Satan. And, you know, the Lord said,
you're of your father the devil. And everybody in this world is
under the influence of one or the other. One or the other. The Lord said, my enemies reproach
me all the day. Oh, blessed are you when men
say all evil against you for my namesake. That's okay. And I'm not, I'm not. Crying
over spilled milk. And I'm not, I'm just saying
that I know that when someone sits in this auditorium and they
make accusations to the person sitting next to them about what
I'm saying, when I'm saying the truth about Christ, that they just, they have a reproach
against Christ. That's who they have a reproach
against. They are mad against him. I have eaten ashes like bread
and mingled my drink with weeping because of thine indignation
and thy wrath." I was accused recently of blaspheming
God because I said that he caused, that he was the first cause of
Job's sufferings. I create evil. I'm the one that
poured out my wrath on my son. It pleased God to bruise him. Our God is the first cause of
all things. There's nothing that's happening
that he's not causing. Has evil come to the city, Amos
said, and the Lord's not caused it? because of thy indignation and
thy wrath, for thou hast lifted me up and cast me down." The Lord Jesus Christ was lifted
up by the Father on Calvary's cross to satisfy divine justice,
bearing our sins and putting them away by the sacrifice of
himself once for all. And they came down off the cross
and they cast him down into the tomb. He was lifted up, he was
cast down. And the Father did it. But here's
what I want you to see. Look. My days, verse 11, are like a
shadow that declineth, and I am withered like grass. But, but
whatever you've ordained is right, and it's good. but thou O Lord
shall endure forever and thy remembrance until all generations. The Lord Jesus Christ was confident
though he was like a pelican and an owl and a sparrow. He
was confident that through all of his afflictions that the father
would hear him. And that the father. Would answer
his prayer and reward him for his work. But thou oh Lord. Now Lord. And there's where our
hope comes. We're followers of Christ. We
know that what God did for his son. He did for us. and will continue as we sang,
great is thy faithfulness at the beginning of the service.
He's as faithful now as he was then. He can't be anything but
faithful. Our merciful heavenly father,
we thank you for your word. We thank you for the fulfillment
of that word in Christ and Lord, we know that our trouble is greater
than we know. What great hope and comfort we
have of knowing that. That in Christ. We are secure. Lord. Cause us to seek you. When you are pleased to hide
your face from us. We ask it in Christ name. Amen. All right, let's stand together.
Number 318, let's stand together, 318. I need thee every hour, most
gracious Lord. No tender voice like thine can
peace afford. I need thee, oh, I need thee. Every hour I need Thee, O bless
me now, my Savior, I come to Thee. I need Thee every hour,
stay Thou nearby. when Thou art nigh. I need Thee, O I need Thee, every
hour I need Thee. O bless me now, my Savior, I
come to Thee. I need thee every hour in joy
or pain. Come quickly and abide, for life
is vain. I need Thee, O I need Thee, every
hour I need Thee. O bless me now, my Savior, I
come to Thee. I need Thee every hour, most
Holy One. Oh, make me Thine indeed, Thou
blessed Son. I need Thee, oh, I need Thee. Every hour I need Thee. Oh, bless me now, my Savior,
I come to Thee.